bad _because_ it is ‘unnatural,’ in these common senses of the term,
is therefore certainly fallacious: and yet such arguments are very
frequently used. But they do not commonly pretend to give a systematic
theory of Ethics. Among attempts to _systematise_ an appeal to nature,
that which is now most prevalent is to be found in the application to
ethical questions of the term ‘Evolution’--in the ethical doctrines
which have been called ‘Evolutionistic.’ These doctrines are those
which maintain that the course of ‘evolution,’ while it shews us the
direction in which we _are_ developing, thereby and for that reason
shews us the direction in which we _ought_ to develop. Writers, who
maintain such a doctrine, are at present very numerous and very
popular; and I propose to take as my example the writer, who is
perhaps the best known of them all--Mr Herbert Spencer. Mr Spencer’s
doctrine, it must be owned, does not offer the _clearest_ example of
the naturalistic fallacy as used in support of Evolutionistic Ethics.
A clearer example might be found in the doctrine of Guyau[5], a writer
who has lately had considerable vogue in France, but who is not so well
known as Spencer. Guyau might almost be called a disciple of Spencer;
he is frankly evolutionistic, and frankly naturalistic; and I may
mention that he does not seem to think that he differs from Spencer by
reason of his naturalism. The point in which he has criticised Spencer
concerns the question how far the ends of ‘pleasure’ and of ‘increased
life’ coincide as motives and means to the attainment of the ideal: he
does not seem to think that he differs from Spencer in the fundamental
principle that the ideal is ‘Quantity of life, measured in breadth
as well as in length,’ or, as Guyau says, ‘Expansion and intensity
of life’; nor in the naturalistic reason which he gives for this
principle. And I am not sure that he does differ from Spencer in these
points. Spencer does, as I shall shew, use the naturalistic fallacy in
details; but with regard to his fundamental principles, the following
doubts occur: Is he fundamentally a Hedonist? And, if so, is he a
naturalistic Hedonist? In that case he would better have been treated
in my next chapter. Does he hold that a tendency to increase quantity
of life is merely a _criterion_ of good conduct? Or does he hold that
such increase of life is marked out by nature as an end at which we
ought to aim?
[5] See _Esquisse d’une Morale sans Obligation ni Sanction_, par
M. Guyau. 4me édition. Paris: F. Alcan, 1896.
I think his language in various places would give colour to all these
hypotheses; though some of them are mutually inconsistent. I will try
to discuss the main points.
=30.= The modern vogue of ‘Evolution’ is chiefly owing to Darwin’s
investigations as to the origin of species. Darwin formed a strictly
biological hypothesis as to the manner in which certain forms of animal
life became established, while others died out and disappeared. His
theory was that this might be accounted for, partly at least, in the
following way. When certain varieties occurred (the cause of their
occurrence is still, in the main, unknown), it might be that some of
the points, in which they varied from their parent species or from
other species then existing, made them better able to persist in the
environment in which they found themselves--less liable to be killed
off. They might, for instance, be better able to endure the cold or
heat or changes of the climate; better able to find nourishment from
what surrounded them; better able to escape from or resist other
species which fed upon them; better fitted to attract or to master the
other sex. Being thus less liable to die, their numbers relatively to
other species would increase; and that very increase in their numbers
might tend towards the extinction of those other species. This theory,
to which Darwin gave the name ‘Natural Selection,’ was also called the
theory of survival of the fittest. The natural process which it thus
described was called evolution. It was very natural to suppose that
evolution meant evolution from what was lower into what was higher;
in fact it was observed that at least one species, commonly called
higher--the species man--had so survived, and among men again it was
supposed that the higher races, ourselves for example, had shewn a
tendency to survive the lower, such as the North American Indians.
We can kill them more easily than they can kill us. The doctrine of
evolution was then represented as an explanation of how the higher
species survives the lower. Spencer, for example, constantly uses
‘more evolved’ as equivalent to ‘higher.’ But it is to be noted that
this forms no part of Darwin’s scientific theory. That theory will
explain, equally well, how by an alteration in the environment (the
gradual cooling of the earth, for example) quite a different species
from man, a species which we think infinitely lower, might survive us.
The survival of the fittest does _not_ mean, as one might suppose, the
survival of what is fittest to fulfil a good purpose best adapted to a
good end: at the last, it means merely the survival of the fittest to
survive; and the value of the scientific theory, and it is a theory of
great value, just consists in shewing what are the causes which produce
certain biological effects. Whether these effects are good or bad, it
cannot pretend to judge.
=31.= But now let us hear what Mr Spencer says about the application of
Evolution to Ethics.
‘I recur,’ he says[6], ‘to the main proposition set forth in these
two chapters, which has, I think, been fully justified. Guided by
the truth that as the conduct with which Ethics deals is part of
conduct at large, conduct at large must be generally understood
before this part can be specially understood; and guided by the
further truth that to understand conduct at large we must understand
the evolution of conduct; we have been led to see that Ethics has
for its subject-matter, that form which universal conduct assumes
during the last stages of its evolution. We have also concluded that
these last stages in the evolution of conduct are those displayed
by the _highest_[7] type of being when he is forced, by increase of
numbers, to live more and more in presence of his fellows. And there
has followed _the corollary that conduct gains ethical sanction_[7]
in proportion as the activities, becoming less and less militant and
more and more industrial, are such as do not necessitate mutual injury
or hindrance, but consist with, and are furthered by, co-operation and
mutual aid.
[6] _Data of Ethics_, Chap. II, § 7, _ad fin._
[7] The italics are mine.
‘These implications of the Evolution-Hypothesis, we shall now see
harmonize with the leading moral ideas men have otherwise reached.’
Now, if we are to take the last sentence strictly--if the propositions
which precede it are really thought by Mr Spencer to be _implications_
of the Evolution-Hypothesis--there can be no doubt that Mr Spencer has
committed the naturalistic fallacy. All that the Evolution-Hypothesis
tells us is that certain kinds of conduct are more evolved than others;
and this is, in fact, all that Mr Spencer has attempted to prove in
the two chapters concerned. Yet he tells us that one of the things it
has proved is that _conduct gains ethical sanction_ in proportion as it
displays certain characteristics. What he has tried to prove is only
that, in proportion as it displays those characteristics, it is _more
evolved_. It is plain, then, that Mr Spencer _identifies_ the gaining
of ethical sanction with the being more evolved: this follows strictly
from his words. But Mr Spencer’s language is extremely loose; and we
shall presently see that he seems to regard the view it here implies
as false. We cannot, therefore, take it as Mr Spencer’s definite view
that ‘better’ means nothing but ‘more evolved’; or even that what is
‘more evolved’ is _therefore_ ‘better.’ But we are entitled to urge
that he is influenced by these views, and therefore by the naturalistic
fallacy. It is only by the assumption of such influence that we can
explain his confusion as to what he has really proved, and the absence
of any attempt to prove, what he says he has proved, that conduct
which is more evolved is better. We shall look in vain for any attempt
to shew that ‘ethical sanction’ is in proportion to ‘evolution,’ or
that it is the ‘highest’ type of being which displays the most evolved
conduct; yet Mr Spencer concludes that this is the case. It is only
fair to assume that he is not sufficiently conscious how much these
propositions stand in need of proof--what a very different thing is
being ‘more evolved’ from being ‘higher’ or ‘better.’ It may, of
course, be true that what is more evolved is also higher and better.
But Mr Spencer does not seem aware that to assert the one is in any
case not the same thing as to assert the other. He argues at length
that certain kinds of conduct are ‘more evolved,’ and then informs
us that he has proved them to gain ethical sanction in proportion,
without any warning that he has omitted the most essential step in such
a proof. Surely this is sufficient evidence that he does not see how
essential that step is.
=32.= Whatever be the degree of Mr Spencer’s own guilt, what has
just been said will serve to illustrate the kind of fallacy which
is constantly committed by those who profess to ‘base’ Ethics on
Evolution. But we must hasten to add that the view which Mr Spencer
elsewhere most emphatically recommends is an utterly different one. It
will be useful briefly to deal with this, in order that no injustice
may be done to Mr Spencer. The discussion will be instructive partly
from the lack of clearness, which Mr Spencer displays, as to the
relation of this view to the ‘evolutionistic’ one just described; and
partly because there is reason to suspect that in this view also he is
influenced by the naturalistic fallacy.
We have seen that, at the end of his second chapter, Mr Spencer seems
to announce that he has already proved certain characteristics of
conduct to be a measure of its ethical value. He seems to think that
he has proved this merely by considering the evolution of conduct; and
he has certainly not given any such proof, unless we are to understand
that ‘more evolved’ is a mere synonym for ‘ethically better.’ He
now promises merely to _confirm_ this certain conclusion by shewing
that it ‘harmonizes with the leading moral ideas men have otherwise
reached.’ But, when we turn to his third chapter, we find that what
he actually does is something quite different. He here asserts that
to establish the conclusion ‘Conduct is better in proportion as it
is more evolved’ an entirely new proof is necessary. That conclusion
will be _false_, unless a certain proposition, of which we have heard
nothing so far, is true--unless it be true that life is _pleasant_ on
the whole. And the ethical proposition, for which he claims the support
of the ‘leading moral ideas’ of mankind, turns out to be that ‘life
is good or bad, according as it does, or does not, bring a surplus
of agreeable feeling’ (§ 10). Here, then, Mr Spencer appears, not as
an Evolutionist, but as a Hedonist, in Ethics. No conduct is better,
_because_ it is more evolved. Degree of evolution can at most be a
_criterion_ of ethical value; and it will only be that, if we can prove
the extremely difficult generalisation that the more evolved is always,
on the whole, the pleasanter. It is plain that Mr Spencer here rejects
the naturalistic identification of ‘better’ with ‘more evolved’;
but it is possible that he is influenced by another naturalistic
identification--that of ‘good’ with ‘pleasant.’ It is possible that Mr
Spencer is a naturalistic Hedonist.
=33.= Let us examine Mr Spencer’s own words. He begins this third
chapter by an attempt to shew that _we call_ ‘good the acts conducive
to life, in self or others, and bad those which directly or indirectly
tend towards death, special or general’ (§ 9). And then he asks: ‘Is
there any assumption made’ in so calling them? ‘Yes’; he answers,
‘an assumption of extreme significance has been made--an assumption
underlying all moral estimates. The question to be definitely raised
and answered before entering on any ethical discussion, is the question
of late much agitated--Is life worth living? Shall we take the
pessimist view? or shall we take the optimist view?... On the answer
to this question depends every decision concerning the goodness or
badness of conduct.’ But Mr Spencer does not immediately proceed to
give the answer. Instead of this, he asks another question: ‘But now,
have these irreconcilable opinions [pessimist and optimist] anything
in common?’ And this question he immediately answers by the statement:
‘Yes, there is one postulate in which pessimists and optimists agree.
Both their arguments assume it to be self-evident that life is good or
bad, according as it does, or does not, bring a surplus of agreeable
feeling’ (§ 10). It is to the defence of this statement that the rest
of the chapter is devoted; and at the end Mr Spencer formulates his
conclusion in the following words: ‘No school can avoid taking for the
ultimate moral aim a desirable state of feeling called by whatever
name--gratification, enjoyment, happiness. Pleasure somewhere, at
some time, to some being or beings, is an inexpugnable element of the
conception’ (§ 16 _ad fin._).
Now in all this, there are two points to which I wish to call
attention. The first is that Mr Spencer does not, after all, tell us
clearly what he takes to be the relation of Pleasure and Evolution in
ethical theory. Obviously he should mean that pleasure is the _only_
intrinsically desirable thing; that other good things are ‘good’ only
in the sense that they are means to its existence. Nothing but this
can properly be meant by asserting it to be ‘_the_ ultimate moral
aim,’ or, as he subsequently says (§ 62 _ad fin._), ‘_the_ ultimately
supreme end.’ And, if this were so, it would follow that the more
evolved conduct was better than the less evolved, only because, and in
proportion as, it gave more pleasure. But Mr Spencer tells us that two
conditions are, taken together, _sufficient_ to prove the more evolved
conduct better: (1) That it should tend to produce more life; (2) That
life should be worth living or contain a balance of pleasure. And the
point I wish to emphasise is that if these conditions are sufficient,
then pleasure cannot be the sole good. For though to produce more life
is, if the second of Mr Spencer’s propositions be correct, _one way_ of
producing more pleasure, it is not the only way. It is quite possible
that a small quantity of life, which was more intensely and uniformly
present, should give a greater quantity of pleasure than the greatest
possible quantity of life that was only just ‘worth living.’ And in
that case, on the hedonistic supposition that pleasure is the only
thing worth having, we should have to prefer the smaller quantity of
life and therefore, according to Mr Spencer, the less evolved conduct.
Accordingly, if Mr Spencer is a true Hedonist, the fact that life gives
a balance of pleasure is _not_, as he seems to think, sufficient to
prove that the more evolved conduct is the better. If Mr Spencer means
us to understand that it _is_ sufficient, then his view about pleasure
can only be, not that it is the sole good or ‘ultimately supreme end,’
but that a balance of it is a necessary constituent of the supreme end.
In short, Mr Spencer seems to maintain that more life is decidedly
better than less, _if only_ it give a balance of pleasure: and that
contention is inconsistent with the position that pleasure is ‘_the_
ultimate moral aim.’ Mr Spencer implies that of two quantities of life,
which gave an equal amount of pleasure, the larger would nevertheless
be preferable to the less. And if this be so, then he must maintain
that quantity of life or degree of evolution is itself an ultimate
condition of value. He leaves us, therefore, in doubt whether he is
not still retaining the Evolutionistic proposition, that the more
evolved is better, simply because it is more evolved, alongside of
the Hedonistic proposition, that the more pleasant is better, simply
because it is more pleasant.
But the second question which we have to ask is: What reasons has Mr
Spencer for assigning to pleasure the position which he does assign
to it? He tells us, we saw, that the ‘arguments’ both of pessimists
and of optimists ‘assume it to be self-evident that life is good or
bad, according as it does, or does not, bring a surplus of agreeable
feeling’; and he betters this later by telling us that ‘since avowed or
implied pessimists, and optimists of one or other shade, taken together
constitute all men, it results that this postulate is universally
accepted’ (§ 16). That these statements are absolutely false is,
of course, quite obvious: but why does Mr Spencer think them true?
and, what is more important (a question which Mr Spencer does not
distinguish too clearly from the last), why does he think the postulate
itself to be true? Mr Spencer himself tells us his ‘proof is’ that
‘reversing the application of the words’ good and bad--applying the
word ‘good’ to conduct, the ‘aggregate results’ of which are painful,
and the word ‘bad’ to conduct, of which the ‘aggregate results’ are
pleasurable--‘creates absurdities’ (§ 16). He does not say whether this
is because it is absurd to think that the quality, which we _mean by
the word_ ‘good,’ really applies to what is painful. Even, however,
if we assume him to mean this, and if we assume that absurdities are
thus created, it is plain he would only prove that what is painful is
properly thought to be _so far_ bad, and what is pleasant to be _so
far_ good: it would not prove at all that pleasure is ‘_the_ supreme
end.’ There is, however, reason to think that part of what Mr Spencer
means is the naturalistic fallacy: that he imagines ‘pleasant’ or
‘productive of pleasure’ is the very meaning of the word ‘good,’ and
that ‘the absurdity’ is due to this. It is at all events certain that
he does not distinguish this possible meaning from that which would
admit that ‘good’ denotes an unique indefinable quality. The doctrine
of naturalistic Hedonism is, indeed, quite strictly implied in his
statement that ‘virtue’ cannot ‘_be defined_ otherwise than in terms of
happiness’ (§ 13); and, though, as I remarked above, we cannot insist
upon Mr Spencer’s words as a certain clue to any definite meaning, that
is only because he generally expresses by them several inconsistent
alternatives--the naturalistic fallacy being, in this case, one such
alternative. It is certainly impossible to find any further reasons
given by Mr Spencer for his conviction that pleasure both is the
supreme end, and is universally admitted to be so. He seems to assume
throughout that we _must_ mean by good conduct what is productive of
pleasure, and by bad what is productive of pain. So far, then, as he is
a Hedonist, he would seem to be a naturalistic Hedonist.
So much for Mr Spencer. It is, of course, quite possible that his
treatment of Ethics contains many interesting and instructive remarks.
It would seem, indeed, that Mr Spencer’s main view, that of which he
is most clearly and most often conscious, is that pleasure is the
sole good, and that to consider the direction of evolution is by far
the best _criterion_ of the way in which we shall get most of it:
and this theory, _if_ he could establish that amount of pleasure is
always in direct proportion to amount of evolution _and also_ that it
was plain what conduct was more evolved, _would_ be a very valuable
contribution to the science of Sociology; it would even, if pleasure
were the sole good, be a valuable contribution to Ethics. But the above
discussion should have made it plain that, if what we want from an
ethical philosopher is a scientific and systematic Ethics, not merely
an Ethics professedly ‘based on science’; if what we want is a clear
discussion of the fundamental principles of Ethics, and a statement of
the ultimate reasons why one way of acting should be considered better
than another--then Mr Spencer’s ‘Data of Ethics’ is immeasurably far
from satisfying these demands.
=34.= It remains only to state clearly what is definitely fallacious
in prevalent views as to the relation of Evolution to Ethics--in
those views with regard to which it seems so uncertain how far Mr
Spencer intends to encourage them. I proposed to confine the term
‘Evolutionistic Ethics’ to the view that we need only to consider the
tendency of ‘evolution’ in order to discover the direction in which
we _ought_ to go. This view must be carefully distinguished from
certain others, which may be commonly confused with it. (1) It might,
for instance, be held that the direction in which living things have
hitherto developed is, as a matter of fact, the direction of progress.
It might be held that the ‘more evolved’ is, as a matter of fact, also
better. And in such a view no fallacy is involved. But, if it is to
give us any guidance as to how we ought to act in the future, it does
involve a long and painful investigation of the exact points in which
the superiority of the more evolved consists. We cannot assume that,
because evolution is progress _on the whole_, therefore every point
in which the more evolved differs from the less is a point in which
it is better than the less. A simple consideration of the course of
evolution will therefore, on this view, by no means suffice to inform
us of the course we ought to pursue. We shall have to employ all the
resources of a strictly ethical discussion in order to arrive at a
correct valuation of the different results of evolution--to distinguish
the more valuable from the less valuable, and both from those which
are no better than their causes, or perhaps even worse. In fact it
is difficult to see how, on this view--if all that be meant is that
evolution has _on the whole_ been a progress--the theory of evolution
can give any assistance to Ethics at all. The judgment that evolution
has been a progress is itself an independent ethical judgment; and even
if we take it to be more certain and obvious than any of the detailed
judgments upon which it must logically depend for confirmation, we
certainly cannot use it as a datum from which to infer details. It is,
at all events, certain that, if this had been the _only_ relation held
to exist between Evolution and Ethics, no such importance would have
been attached to the bearing of Evolution on Ethics as we actually find
claimed for it. (2) The view, which, as I have said, seems to be Mr
Spencer’s main view, may also be held without fallacy. It may be held
that the more evolved, though not itself the better, is a _criterion_,
because a concomitant, of the better. But this view also obviously
involves an exhaustive preliminary discussion of the fundamental
ethical question what, after all, is better. That Mr Spencer entirely
dispenses with such a discussion in support of his contention that
pleasure is the sole good, I have pointed out; and that, if we attempt
such a discussion, we shall arrive at no such simple result, I shall
presently try to shew. If however the good is not simple, it is by
no means likely that we shall be able to discover Evolution to be a
criterion of it. We shall have to establish a relation between two
highly complicated sets of data; and, moreover, if we had once settled
what were goods, and what their comparative values, it is extremely
unlikely that we should need to call in the aid of Evolution as a
criterion of how to get the most. It is plain, then, again, that if
this were the only relation imagined to exist between Evolution and
Ethics, it could hardly have been thought to justify the assignment
of any importance in Ethics to the theory of Evolution. Finally, (3)
it may be held that, though Evolution gives us no help in discovering
what results of our efforts will be best, it does give some help in
discovering what it is _possible_ to attain and what are the means to
its attainment. That the theory really may be of service to Ethics in
this way cannot be denied. But it is certainly not common to find this
humble, ancillary bearing clearly and exclusively assigned to it. In
the mere fact, then, that these non-fallacious views of the relation
of Evolution to Ethics would give so very little importance to that
relation, we have evidence that what is typical in the coupling of the
two names is the fallacious view to which I propose to restrict the
name ‘Evolutionistic Ethics.’ This is the view that we ought to move
in the direction of evolution simply _because_ it is the direction
of evolution. That the forces of Nature are working on that side is
taken as a presumption that it is the right side. That such a view,
apart from metaphysical presuppositions, with which I shall presently
deal, is simply fallacious, I have tried to shew. It can only rest on
a confused belief that somehow the good simply _means_ the side on
which Nature is working. And it thus involves another confused belief
which is very marked in Mr Spencer’s whole treatment of Evolution.
For, after all, is Evolution the side on which Nature is working? In
the sense, which Mr Spencer gives to the term, and in any sense in
which it can be regarded as a fact that the more evolved is higher,
Evolution denotes only a _temporary_ historical process. That things
will permanently continue to evolve in the future, or that they have
always evolved in the past, we have not the smallest reason to believe.
For Evolution does not, in this sense, denote a natural _law_, like
the law of gravity. Darwin’s theory of natural selection does indeed
state a natural law: it states that, given certain conditions, certain
results will always happen. But Evolution, as Mr Spencer understands
it and as it is commonly understood, denotes something very different.
It denotes only a process which has actually occurred at a given time,
because the conditions at the beginning of that time happened to be of
a certain nature. That such conditions will always be given, or have
always been given, cannot be assumed; and it is only the process which,
according to natural law, must follow from _these_ conditions and no
others, that appears to be also on the whole a progress. Precisely the
same natural laws--Darwin’s, for instance--would under other conditions
render inevitable not Evolution--not a development from lower to
higher--but the converse process, which has been called Involution. Yet
Mr Spencer constantly speaks of the process which is exemplified in
the development of man as if it had all the augustness of a universal
Law of Nature: whereas we have no reason to believe it other than a
temporary accident, requiring not only certain universal natural laws,
but also the existence of a certain state of things at a certain time.
The only _laws_ concerned in the matter are certainly such as, under
other circumstances, would allow us to infer, not the development,
but the extinction of man. And that circumstances will always be
favourable to further development, that Nature will always work on the
side of Evolution, we have no reason whatever to believe. Thus the
idea that Evolution throws important light on Ethics seems to be due
to a double confusion. Our respect for the process is enlisted by the
representation of it as the Law of Nature. But, on the other hand, our
respect for Laws of Nature would be speedily diminished, did we not
imagine that this desirable process was one of them. To suppose that a
Law of Nature is _therefore_ respectable, is to commit the naturalistic
fallacy; but no one, probably, would be tempted to commit it, unless
something which _is_ respectable, were represented as a Law of Nature.
If it were clearly recognised that there is no evidence for supposing
Nature to be on the side of the Good, there would probably be less
tendency to hold the opinion, which on other grounds is demonstrably
false, that no such evidence is required. And if both false opinions
were clearly seen to be false, it would be plain that Evolution has
very little indeed to say to Ethics.
=35.= In this chapter I have begun the criticism of certain ethical
views, which seem to owe their influence mainly to the naturalistic
fallacy--the fallacy which consists in identifying the simple notion
which we mean by ‘good’ with some other notion. They are views which
profess to tell us what is good in itself; and my criticism of them
is mainly directed (1) to bring out the negative result, that we have
no reason to suppose that which they declare to be the sole good,
really to be so, (2) to illustrate further the positive result, already
established in Chapter I, that the fundamental principles of Ethics
must be _synthetic_ propositions, declaring what things, and in what
degree, possess a simple and unanalysable property which may be called
‘intrinsic value’ or ‘goodness.’ The chapter began (1) by dividing the
views to be criticised into (_a_) those which, supposing ‘good’ to
be defined by reference to some supersensible reality, conclude that
the sole good is to be found in such a reality, and may therefore be
called ‘Metaphysical,’ (_b_) those which assign a similar position to
some natural object, and may therefore be called ‘Naturalistic.’ Of
naturalistic views, that which regards ‘pleasure’ as the sole good has
received far the fullest and most serious treatment and was therefore
reserved for Chapter III: all other forms of Naturalism may be first
dismissed, by taking typical examples (24-26). (2) As typical of
naturalistic views, other than Hedonism, there was first taken the
popular commendation of what is ‘natural’: it was pointed out that by
‘natural’ there might here be meant either ‘normal’ or ‘necessary,’
and that neither the ‘normal’ nor the ‘necessary’ could be seriously
supposed to be either always good or the only good things (27-28). (3)
But a more important type, because one which claims to be capable of
system, is to be found in ‘Evolutionistic Ethics.’ The influence of the
fallacious opinion that to be ‘better’ _means_ to be ‘more evolved’ was
illustrated by an examination of Mr Herbert Spencer’s Ethics; and it
was pointed out that, but for the influence of this opinion, Evolution
could hardly have been supposed to have any important bearing upon
Ethics (29-34).
CHAPTER III.
HEDONISM.
=36.= In this chapter we have to deal with what is perhaps the most
famous and the most widely held of all ethical principles--the
principle that nothing is good but pleasure. My chief reason for
treating of this principle in this place is, as I said, that Hedonism
appears in the main to be a form of Naturalistic Ethics: in other
words, that pleasure has been so generally held to be the sole good,
is almost entirely due to the fact that it has seemed to be somehow
involved in the _definition_ of ‘good’--to be pointed out by the very
meaning of the word. If this is so, then the prevalence of Hedonism has
been mainly due to what I have called the naturalistic fallacy--the
failure to distinguish clearly that unique and indefinable quality
which we mean by good. And that it is so, we have very strong evidence
in the fact that, of all hedonistic writers, Prof. Sidgwick alone has
clearly recognised that by ‘good’ we do mean something unanalysable,
and has alone been led thereby to emphasise the fact that, if
Hedonism be true, its claims to be so must be rested solely on its
self-evidence--that we must maintain ‘Pleasure is the sole good’ to be
a mere _intuition_. It appeared to Prof. Sidgwick as a new discovery
that what he calls the ‘method’ of Intuitionism must be retained as
valid alongside of, and indeed as the foundation of, what he calls the
alternative ‘methods’ of Utilitarianism and Egoism. And that it was a
new discovery can hardly be doubted. In previous Hedonists we find no
clear and consistent recognition of the fact that their fundamental
proposition involves the assumption that a certain unique predicate
can be directly seen to belong to pleasure alone among existents: they
do not emphasise, as they could hardly have failed to have done had
they perceived it, how utterly independent of all other truths this
truth must be.
Moreover it is easy to see how this unique position should have
been assigned to pleasure without any clear consciousness of the
assumption involved. Hedonism is, for a sufficiently obvious reason,
the first conclusion at which any one who begins to reflect upon
Ethics naturally arrives. It is very easy to notice the fact that we
are pleased with things. The things we enjoy and the things we do not,
form two unmistakable classes, to which our attention is constantly
directed. But it is comparatively difficult to distinguish the fact
that we _approve_ a thing from the fact that we are pleased with it.
Although, if we look at the two states of mind, we must see that they
are different, even though they generally go together, it is very
difficult to see in _what respect_ they are different, or that the
difference can in any connection be of more importance than the many
other differences, which are so patent and yet so difficult to analyse,
between one _kind_ of enjoyment and another. It is very difficult to
see that by ‘approving’ of a thing we mean _feeling that it has a
certain predicate_--the predicate, namely, which defines the peculiar
sphere of Ethics; whereas in the enjoyment of a thing no such unique
object of thought is involved. Nothing is more natural than the vulgar
mistake, which we find expressed in a recent book on Ethics[8]: ‘The
primary ethical fact is, we have said, that something is approved
or disapproved: that is, in other words, the ideal representation
of certain events in the way of sensation, perception, or idea, is
attended with a feeling of pleasure or of pain.’ In ordinary speech,
‘I want this,’ ‘I like this,’ ‘I care about this’ are constantly used
as equivalents for ‘I think this good.’ And in this way it is very
natural to be led to suppose that there is no distinct class of ethical
judgments, but only the class ‘things enjoyed’; in spite of the fact,
which is very clear, if not very common, that we do not always approve
what we enjoy. It is of course, very obvious that from the supposition
that ‘I think this good’ is identical with ‘I am pleased with this,’
it cannot be _logically_ inferred that pleasure alone is good. But, on
the other hand, it is very difficult to see what could be logically
inferred from such a supposition; and it seems _natural_ enough that
such an inference should suggest itself. A very little examination
of what is commonly written on the subject will suffice to shew that
a logical confusion of this nature is very common. Moreover the very
commission of the naturalistic fallacy involves that those who commit
it should not recognise clearly the meaning of the proposition ‘This
is good’--that they should not be able to distinguish this from other
propositions which seem to resemble it; and, where this is so, it is,
of course, impossible that its logical relations should be clearly
perceived.
[8] A. E. Taylor’s _Problem of Conduct_, p. 120.
=37.= There is, therefore, ample reason to suppose that Hedonism is in
general a form of Naturalism--that its acceptance is generally due to
the naturalistic fallacy. It is, indeed, only when we have detected
this fallacy, when we have become clearly aware of the unique object
which is meant by ‘good,’ that we are able to give to Hedonism the
precise definition used above, ‘Nothing is good but pleasure’: and it
may, therefore, be objected that, in attacking this doctrine under the
name of Hedonism, I am attacking a doctrine which has never really been
held. But it is very common to hold a doctrine, without being clearly
aware what it is you hold; and though, when Hedonists argue in favour
of what they call Hedonism, I admit that, in order to suppose their
arguments valid, they must have before their minds something _other_
than the doctrine I have defined, yet, in order to draw the conclusions
that they draw, it is necessary that they should _also_ have before
their minds this doctrine. In fact, my justification for supposing that
I shall have refuted _historical_ Hedonism, if I refute the proposition
‘Nothing is good but pleasure,’ is, that although Hedonists have
rarely stated their principle in this form and though its truth, in
this form, will certainly not follow from their arguments, yet their
ethical _method_ will follow logically from nothing else. Any pretence
of the hedonistic method, to discover to us practical truths which
we should not otherwise have known, is founded on the principle that
the course of action which will bring the greatest balance of pleasure
is certainly the right one; and, failing an absolute proof that the
greatest balance of pleasure _always_ coincides with the greatest
balance of other goods, which it is not generally attempted to give,
this principle can only be justified if pleasure be the sole good.
Indeed it can hardly be doubted that Hedonists are distinguished by
arguing, in disputed practical questions, _as if_ pleasure were the
sole good; and that it is justifiable, for this among other reasons, to
take this as _the_ ethical principle of Hedonism will, I hope, be made
further evident by the whole discussion of this chapter.
By Hedonism, then, I mean the doctrine that pleasure _alone_ is good
as an end--‘good’ in the sense which I have tried to point out as
indefinable. The doctrine that pleasure, _among other things_, is good
as an end, is not Hedonism; and I shall not dispute its truth. Nor
again is the doctrine that other things, beside pleasure, are good as
means, at all inconsistent with Hedonism: the Hedonist is not bound
to maintain that ‘Pleasure alone is good,’ if under good he includes,
as we generally do, what is good as means to an end, _as well as_ the
end itself. In attacking Hedonism, I am therefore simply and solely
attacking the doctrine that ‘Pleasure _alone_ is good as an end or in
itself’: I am not attacking the doctrine that ‘Pleasure _is_ good as an
end or in itself,’ nor am I attacking any doctrine whatever as to what
are the best means we can take in order to obtain pleasure or any other
end. Hedonists do, in general, recommend a course of conduct which is
very similar to that which I should recommend. I do not quarrel with
them about most of their practical conclusions, I quarrel only with the
reasons by which they seem to think their conclusions can be supported;
and I do emphatically deny that the correctness of their conclusions is
any ground for inferring the correctness of their principles. A correct
conclusion may always be obtained by fallacious reasoning; and the good
life or virtuous maxims of a Hedonist afford absolutely no presumption
that his ethical philosophy is also good. It is his ethical philosophy
alone with which I am concerned: what I dispute is the excellence of
his reasoning, not the excellence of his character as a man or even as
moral teacher. It may be thought that my contention is unimportant, but
that is no ground for thinking that I am not in the right. What I am
concerned with is knowledge only--that we should think correctly and so
far arrive at some truth, however unimportant: I do not say that such
knowledge will make us more useful members of society. If any one does
not care for knowledge for its own sake, then I have nothing to say to
him; only it should not be thought that a lack of interest in what I
have to say is any ground for holding it untrue.
=38.= Hedonists, then, hold that all other things but pleasure, whether
conduct or virtue or knowledge, whether life or nature or beauty, are
only good as means to pleasure or for the sake of pleasure, never
for their own sakes or as ends in themselves. This view was held by
Aristippus, the disciple of Socrates, and by the Cyrenaic school which
he founded; it is associated with Epicurus and the Epicureans; and
it has been held in modern times, chiefly by those philosophers who
call themselves ‘Utilitarians’--by Bentham, and by Mill, for instance.
Herbert Spencer, as we have seen, also says he holds it; and Professor
Sidgwick, as we shall see, holds it too.
Yet all these philosophers, as has been said, differ from one
another more or less, both as to what they mean by Hedonism, and as
to the reasons for which it is to be accepted as a true doctrine.
The matter is therefore obviously not quite so simple as it might
at first appear. My own object will be to shew quite clearly what
the theory must imply, if it is made precise, if all confusions and
inconsistencies are removed from the conception of it; and, when
this is done, I think it will appear that all the various reasons
given for holding it to be true, are really quite inadequate; that
they are not reasons for holding Hedonism, but only for holding some
other doctrine which is confused therewith. In order to attain this
object I propose to take first Mill’s doctrine, as set forth in his
book called _Utilitarianism_: we shall find in Mill a conception of
Hedonism, and arguments in its favour, which fairly represent those
of a large class of hedonistic writers. To these representative
conceptions and arguments grave objections, objections which appear to
me to be conclusive, have been urged by Professor Sidgwick. These I
shall try to give in my own words; and shall then proceed to consider
and refute Professor Sidgwick’s own much more precise conceptions and
arguments. With this, I think, we shall have traversed the whole field
of Hedonistic doctrine. It will appear, from the discussion, that the
task of deciding what is or is not good in itself is by no means an
easy one; and in this way the discussion will afford a good example
of the method which it is necessary to pursue in attempting to arrive
at the truth with regard to this primary class of ethical principles.
In particular it will appear that two principles of method must be
constantly kept in mind: (1) that the naturalistic fallacy must not
be committed; (2) that the distinction between means and ends must be
observed.
=39.= I propose, then, to begin by an examination of Mill’s
_Utilitarianism_. That is a book which contains an admirably clear and
fair discussion of many ethical principles and methods. Mill exposes
not a few simple mistakes which are very likely to be made by those
who approach ethical problems without much previous reflection. But
what I am concerned with is the mistakes which Mill himself appears
to have made, and these only so far as they concern the Hedonistic
principle. Let me repeat what that principle is. It is, I said, that
pleasure is the only thing at which we ought to aim, the only thing
that is good as an end and for its own sake. And now let us turn to
Mill and see whether he accepts this description of the question at
issue. ‘Pleasure,’ he says at the outset, ‘and freedom from pain, are
the only things desirable as ends’ (p. 10[9]); and again, at the end
of his argument, ‘To think of an object as desirable (unless for the
sake of its consequences) and to think of it as pleasant are one and
the same thing’ (p. 58). These statements, taken together, and apart
from certain confusions which are obvious in them, seem to imply the
principle I have stated; and if I succeed in shewing that Mill’s
reasons for them do not prove them, it must at least be admitted that I
have not been fighting with shadows or demolishing a man of straw.
[9] My references are to the 13th edition, 1897.
It will be observed that Mill adds ‘absence of pain’ to ‘pleasure’
in his first statement, though not in his second. There is, in this,
a confusion, with which, however, we need not deal. I shall talk of
‘pleasure’ alone, for the sake of conciseness; but all my arguments
will apply _à fortiori_ to ‘absence of pain’: it is easy to make the
necessary substitutions.
Mill holds, then, that ‘happiness is desirable, and _the only thing
desirable_[10], as an end; all other things being only desirable
as means to that end’ (p. 52). Happiness he has already defined as
‘pleasure, and the absence of pain’ (p. 10); he does not pretend that
this is more than an arbitrary verbal definition; and, as _such_, I
have not a word to say against it. His principle, then, is ‘pleasure is
the only thing desirable,’ if I may be allowed, when I say ‘pleasure,’
to include in that word (so far as necessary) absence of pain. And
now what are his reasons for holding that principle to be true? He
has already told us (p. 6) that ‘Questions of ultimate ends are not
amenable to direct proof. Whatever can be proved to be good, must be so
by being shewn to be a means to something _admitted to be good without
proof_.’ With this, I perfectly agree: indeed the chief object of my
first chapter was to shew that this is so. Anything which is good as an
end must be admitted to be good without proof. We are agreed so far.
Mill even uses the same examples which I used in my second chapter.
‘How,’ he says, ‘is it possible to prove that health is good?’ ‘What
proof is it possible to give that pleasure is good?’ Well, in Chapter
IV, in which he deals with the proof of his Utilitarian principle, Mill
repeats the above statement in these words: ‘It has already,’ he says,
‘been remarked, that questions of ultimate ends do not admit of proof,
in the ordinary acceptation of the term’ (p. 52). ‘Questions about
ends,’ he goes on in this same passage, ‘are, in other words, questions
what things are desirable.’ I am quoting these repetitions, because
they make it plain what otherwise might have been doubted, that Mill is
using the words ‘desirable’ or ‘desirable as an end’ as absolutely and
precisely equivalent to the words ‘good as an end.’ We are, then, now
to hear, what reasons he advances for this doctrine that pleasure alone
is good as an end.
[10] My italics.
=40.= ‘Questions about ends,’ he says (pp. 52-3), ‘are, in other words,
questions what things are desirable. The utilitarian doctrine is, that
happiness is desirable, and the only thing desirable, as an end; all
other things being only desirable as means to that end. What ought to
be required of this doctrine--what conditions is it requisite that the
doctrine should fulfil--to make good its claim to be believed?
‘The only proof capable of being given that a thing is visible, is that
people actually see it. The only proof that a sound is audible, is
that people hear it; and so of the other sources of our experience. In
like manner, I apprehend, the sole evidence it is possible to produce
that anything is desirable, is that people do actually desire it. If
the end which the utilitarian doctrine proposes to itself were not,
in theory and in practice, acknowledged to be an end, nothing could
ever convince any person that it was so. No reason can be given why
the general happiness is desirable, except that each person, so far
as he believes it to be attainable, desires his own happiness. This,
however, being the fact, we have not only all the proof which the case
admits of, but all which it is possible to require, that happiness is
a good: that each person’s happiness is a good to that person, and the
general happiness, therefore, a good to the aggregate of all persons.
Happiness has made out its title as _one_ of the ends of conduct, and
consequently one of the criteria of morality.’
There, that is enough. That is my first point. Mill has made as naïve
and artless a use of the naturalistic fallacy as anybody could desire.
‘Good,’ he tells us, means ‘desirable,’ and you can only find out what
is desirable by seeking to find out what is actually desired. This is,
of course, only one step towards the proof of Hedonism; for it may be,
as Mill goes on to say, that other things beside pleasure are desired.
Whether or not pleasure is the only thing desired is, as Mill himself
admits (p. 58), a psychological question, to which we shall presently
proceed. The important step for Ethics is this one just taken, the
step which pretends to prove that ‘good’ means ‘desired.’ Well, the
fallacy in this step is so obvious, that it is quite wonderful how Mill
failed to see it. The fact is that ‘desirable’ does not mean ‘able to
be desired’ as ‘visible’ means ‘able to be seen.’ The desirable means
simply what _ought_ to be desired or _deserves_ to be desired; just
as the detestable means not what can be but what ought to be detested
and the damnable what deserves to be damned. Mill has, then, smuggled
in, under cover of the word ‘desirable,’ the very notion about which
he ought to be quite clear. ‘Desirable’ does indeed mean ‘what it is
good to desire’; but when this is understood, it is no longer plausible
to say that our only test of _that_, is what is actually desired. Is
it merely a tautology when the Prayer Book talks of _good_ desires?
Are not _bad_ desires also possible? Nay, we find Mill himself talking
of a ‘better and nobler object of desire’ (p. 10), as if, after all,
what is desired were not _ipso facto_ good, and good in proportion to
the amount it is desired. Moreover, if the desired is _ipso facto_ the
good; then the good is _ipso facto_ the motive of our actions, and
there can be no question of finding motives for doing it, as Mill is
at such pains to do. If Mill’s explanation of ‘desirable’ be _true_,
then his statement (p. 26) that the rule of action may be _confounded_
with the motive of it is untrue: for the motive of action will then be
according to him _ipso facto_ its rule; there can be no distinction
between the two, and therefore no confusion, and thus he has
contradicted himself flatly. These are specimens of the contradictions,
which, as I have tried to shew, must always follow from the use of
the naturalistic fallacy; and I hope I need now say no more about the
matter.
=41.= Well, then, the first step by which Mill has attempted to
establish his Hedonism is simply fallacious. He has attempted to
establish the identity of the good with the desired, by confusing the
proper sense of ‘desirable,’ in which it denotes that which it is good
to desire, with the sense which it would bear, if it were analogous
to such words as ‘visible.’ If ‘desirable’ is to be identical with
‘good,’ then it must bear one sense; and if it is to be identical with
‘desired,’ then it must bear quite another sense. And yet to Mill’s
contention that the desired is necessarily good, it is quite essential
that these two senses of ‘desirable’ should be the same. If he holds
they are the same, then he has contradicted himself elsewhere; if
he holds they are not the same, then the first step in his proof of
Hedonism is absolutely worthless.
But now we must deal with the second step. Having proved, as he thinks,
that the good means the desired, Mill recognises that, if he is further
to maintain that pleasure alone is good, he must prove that pleasure
alone is really desired. This doctrine that ‘pleasure alone is the
object of all our desires’ is the doctrine which Prof. Sidgwick has
called Psychological Hedonism: and it is a doctrine which most eminent
psychologists are now agreed in rejecting. But it is a necessary step
in the proof of any such Naturalistic Hedonism as Mill’s; and it is
so commonly held, by people not expert either in psychology or in
philosophy, that I wish to treat it at some length. It will be seen
that Mill does not hold it in this bare form. He admits that other
things than pleasure are desired; and this admission is at once a
contradiction of his Hedonism. One of the shifts by which he seeks
to evade this contradiction we shall afterwards consider. But some
may think that no such shifts are needed: they may say of Mill, what
Callicles says of Polus in the _Gorgias_[11], that he has made this
fatal admission through a most unworthy fear of appearing paradoxical;
that they, on the other hand, will have the courage of their
convictions, and will not be ashamed to go to any lengths of paradox,
in defence of what they hold to be the truth.
[11] 481 C-487 B.
=42.= Well, then, we are supposing it held that pleasure is the object
of all desire, that it is the universal end of all human activity.
Now I suppose it will not be denied that people are commonly said to
desire other things: for instance, we usually talk of desiring food
and drink, of desiring money, approbation, fame. The question, then,
must be of what is meant by desire, and by the object of desire. There
is obviously asserted some sort of necessary or universal relation
between something which is called desire, and another thing which is
called pleasure. The question is of what sort this relation is; whether
in conjunction with the naturalistic fallacy above mentioned, it will
justify Hedonism. Now I am not prepared to deny that there is some
universal relation between pleasure and desire; but I hope to shew,
that, if there is, it is of such sort as will rather make against than
for Hedonism. It is urged that pleasure is always the object of desire,
and I am ready to admit that pleasure is always, in part at least, the
_cause_ of desire. But this distinction is very important. Both views
might be expressed in the same language; both might be said to hold
that whenever we desire, we always desire _because of_ some pleasure:
if I asked my supposed Hedonist, ‘Why do you desire that?’ he might
answer, quite consistently with his contention, ‘Because there is
pleasure there,’ and if he asked me the same question, I might answer,
equally consistently with my contention, ‘Because there is pleasure
here.’ Only our two answers would not mean the same thing. It is this
use of the same language to denote quite different facts, which I
believe to be the chief cause why Psychological Hedonism is so often
held, just as it was also the cause of Mill’s naturalistic fallacy.
Let us try to analyse the psychological state which is called ‘desire.’
That name is usually confined to a state of mind in which the idea of
some object or event, not yet existing, is present to us. Suppose,
for instance, I am desiring a glass of port wine. I have the idea of
drinking such a glass before my mind, although I am not yet drinking
it. Well, how does pleasure enter in to this relation? My theory is
that it enters in, in this way. The _idea_ of the drinking causes a
feeling of pleasure in my mind, which helps to produce that state
of incipient activity, which is called ‘desire.’ It is, therefore,
because of a pleasure, which I already have--the pleasure excited
by a mere idea--that I desire the wine, which I have not. And I am
ready to admit that a pleasure of this kind, an actual pleasure, is
always among the causes of every desire, and not only of every desire,
but of every mental activity, whether conscious or sub-conscious. I
am ready to _admit_ this, I say: I cannot vouch that it is the true
psychological doctrine; but, at all events, it is not _primâ facie_
quite absurd. And now, what is the other doctrine, the doctrine which
I am supposing held, and which is at all events essential to Mill’s
argument? It is this. That when I desire the wine, it is not the wine
which I desire but the pleasure which I expect to get from it. In
other words, the doctrine is that the idea of a pleasure _not actual_
is always necessary to cause desire; whereas my doctrine was that the
_actual_ pleasure caused by the idea of something else was always
necessary to cause desire. It is these two different theories which I
suppose the Psychological Hedonists to confuse: the confusion is, as
Mr Bradley puts it[12], between ‘a pleasant thought’ and ‘the thought
of a pleasure.’ It is in fact only where the latter, the ‘thought of
a pleasure,’ is present, that pleasure can be said to be the _object_
of desire, or the _motive_ to action. On the other hand, when only a
pleasant thought is present, as, I admit, _may_ always be the case,
then it is the object of the thought--that which we are thinking
about--which is the object of desire and the motive to action; and the
pleasure, which that thought excites, may, indeed, cause our desire or
move us to action, but it is not our end or object nor our motive.
[12] _Ethical Studies_, p. 232.
Well, I hope this distinction is sufficiently clear. Now let us see how
it bears upon Ethical Hedonism. I assume it to be perfectly obvious
that the idea of the object of desire is not always and only the idea
of a pleasure. In the first place, plainly, we are not always conscious
of expecting pleasure, when we desire a thing. We may be only conscious
of the thing which we desire, and may be impelled to make for it at
once, without any calculation as to whether it will bring us pleasure
or pain. And, in the second place, even when we do expect pleasure,
it can certainly be very rarely pleasure _only_ which we desire. For
instance, granted that, when I desire my glass of port wine, I have
also an idea of the pleasure I expect from it, plainly that pleasure
cannot be the only object of my desire; the port wine must be included
in my object, else I might be led by my desire to take wormwood instead
of wine. If the desire were directed _solely_ towards the pleasure,
it could not lead me to take the wine; if it is to take a definite
direction, it is absolutely necessary that the idea of the object, from
which the pleasure is expected, should also be present and should
control my activity. The theory then that what is desired is always and
only pleasure must break down: it is impossible to prove that pleasure
alone is good, by that line of argument. But, if we substitute for this
theory, that other, possibly true, theory, that pleasure is always the
cause of desire, then all the plausibility of our ethical doctrine
that pleasure alone is good straightway disappears. For in this case,
pleasure is not what I desire, it is not what I want: it is something
which I already have, before I can want anything. And can any one feel
inclined to maintain, that that which I already have, while I am still
desiring something else, is always and alone the good?
=43.= But now let us return to consider another of Mill’s arguments
for his position that ‘happiness is the sole end of human action.’
Mill admits, as I have said, that pleasure is not the only thing we
actually desire. ‘The desire of virtue,’ he says, ‘is not as universal,
but it is as authentic a fact, as the desire of happiness[13].’ And
again, ‘Money is, in many cases, desired in and for itself[14].’ These
admissions are, of course, in naked and glaring contradiction with
his argument that pleasure is the only thing desirable, because it
is the only thing desired. How then does Mill even attempt to avoid
this contradiction? His chief argument seems to be that ‘virtue,’
‘money’ and other such objects, when they are thus desired in and
for themselves, are desired only as ‘a part of happiness[15].’ Now
what does this mean? Happiness, as we saw, has been defined by Mill,
as ‘pleasure and the absence of pain.’ Does Mill mean to say that
‘money,’ these actual coins, which he admits to be desired in and
for themselves, are a part either of pleasure or of the absence of
pain? Will he maintain that those coins themselves are in my mind,
and actually a part of my pleasant feelings? If this is to be said,
all words are useless: nothing can possibly be distinguished from
anything else; if these two things are not distinct, what on earth is?
We shall hear next that this table is really and truly the same thing
as this room; that a cab-horse is in fact indistinguishable from St
Paul’s Cathedral; that this book of Mill’s which I hold in my hand,
because it was his pleasure to produce it, is now and at this moment
a part of the happiness which he felt many years ago and which has
so long ceased to be. Pray consider a moment what this contemptible
nonsense really means. ‘Money,’ says Mill, ‘is only desirable as a
means to happiness.’ Perhaps so; but what then? ‘Why,’ says Mill,
‘money is undoubtedly desired for its own sake.’ ‘Yes, go on,’ say we.
‘Well,’ says Mill, ‘if money is desired for its own sake, it must be
desirable as an end-in-itself: I have said so myself.’ ‘Oh,’ say we,
‘but you also said just now that it was only desirable as a means.’ ‘I
own I did,’ says Mill, ‘but I will try to patch up matters, by saying
that what is only a means to an end, is the same thing as a part of
that end. I daresay the public won’t notice.’ And the public haven’t
noticed. Yet this is certainly what Mill has done. He has broken down
the distinction between means and ends, upon the precise observance of
which his Hedonism rests. And he has been compelled to do this, because
he has failed to distinguish ‘end’ in the sense of what is desirable,
from ‘end’ in the sense of what is desired: a distinction which,
nevertheless, both the present argument and his whole book presupposes.
This is a consequence of the naturalistic fallacy.
[13] p. 53.
[14] p. 55.
[15] pp. 56-7.
=44.= Mill, then, has nothing better to say for himself than this. His
two fundamental propositions are, in his own words, ‘that to think of
an object as desirable (unless for the sake of its consequences), and
to think of it as pleasant, are one and the same thing; and that to
desire anything except in proportion as the idea of it is pleasant,
is a physical and metaphysical impossibility[16].’ Both of these
statements are, we have seen, merely supported by fallacies. The first
seems to rest on the naturalistic fallacy; the second rests partly on
this, partly on the fallacy of confusing ends and means, and partly
on the fallacy of confusing a pleasant thought with the thought of a
pleasure. His very language shews this. For that the idea of a thing is
pleasant, in his second clause, is obviously meant to be the same fact
which he denotes by ‘thinking of it as pleasant,’ in his first.
[16] p. 58.
Accordingly, Mill’s arguments for the proposition that pleasure is the
sole good, and our refutation of those arguments, may be summed up as
follows:
First of all, he takes ‘the desirable,’ which he uses as a synonym
for ‘the good,’ to _mean_ what _can_ be desired. The test, again, of
what can be desired, is, according to him, what actually is desired:
if, therefore, he says, we can find some one thing which is always and
alone desired, that thing will necessarily be the only thing that is
desirable, the only thing that is good as an end. In this argument the
naturalistic fallacy is plainly involved. That fallacy, I explained,
consists in the contention that good _means_ nothing but some simple or
complex notion, that can be defined in terms of natural qualities. In
Mill’s case, good is thus supposed to _mean_ simply what is desired;
and what is desired is something which can thus be defined in natural
terms. Mill tells us that we ought to desire something (an ethical
proposition), because we actually do desire it; but if his contention
that ‘I ought to desire’ means nothing but ‘I do desire’ were true,
then he is only entitled to say, ‘We do desire so and so, because we
do desire it’; and that is not an ethical proposition at all; it is
a mere tautology. The whole object of Mill’s book is to help us to
discover what we ought to do; but, in fact, by attempting to define the
meaning of this ‘ought,’ he has completely debarred himself from ever
fulfilling that object: he has confined himself to telling us what we
do do.
Mill’s first argument then is that, because good means desired,
therefore the desired is good; but having thus arrived at an ethical
conclusion, by denying that any ethical conclusion is possible, he
still needs another argument to make his conclusion a basis for
Hedonism. He has to prove that we always do desire pleasure or freedom
from pain, and that we never desire anything else whatever. This second
doctrine, which Professor Sidgwick has called Psychological Hedonism,
I accordingly discussed. I pointed out how obviously untrue it is that
we never desire anything but pleasure; and how there is not a shadow
of ground for saying even that, whenever we desire anything, we always
desire pleasure _as well as_ that thing. I attributed the obstinate
belief in these untruths partly to a confusion between the cause of
desire and the object of desire. It may, I said, be true that desire
can never occur unless it be preceded by some _actual_ pleasure; but
even if this is true, it obviously gives no ground for saying that the
object of desire is always some _future_ pleasure. By the object of
desire is meant that, of which the idea causes desire in us; it is some
pleasure, which we anticipate, some pleasure which we have not got,
which is the object of desire, whenever we do desire pleasure. And any
actual pleasure, which may be excited by the idea of this anticipated
pleasure, is obviously not the same pleasure as that anticipated
pleasure, of which only the idea is actual. This actual pleasure is not
what we want; what we want is always something which we have not got;
and to say that pleasure always causes us to want is quite a different
thing from saying that what we want is always pleasure.
Finally, we saw, Mill admits all this. He insists that we do _actually_
desire other things than pleasure, and yet he says we do _really_
desire nothing else. He tries to explain away this contradiction,
by confusing together two notions, which he has before carefully
distinguished--the notions of means and of end. He now says that a
means to an end is the same thing as a part of that end. To this last
fallacy special attention should be given, as our ultimate decision
with regard to Hedonism will largely turn upon it.
=45.= It is this ultimate decision with regard to Hedonism at which
we must now try to arrive. So far I have been only occupied with
refuting Mill’s naturalistic arguments for Hedonism; but the doctrine
that pleasure alone is desirable may still be true, although Mill’s
fallacies cannot prove it so. This is the question which we have now
to face. This proposition, ‘pleasure alone is good or desirable,’
belongs undoubtedly to that class of propositions, to which Mill at
first rightly pretended it belonged, the class of first principles,
which are not amenable to direct proof. But in this case, as he also
rightly says, ‘considerations may be presented capable of determining
the intellect either to give or withhold its assent to the doctrine’
(p. 7). It is such considerations that Professor Sidgwick presents,
and such also that I shall try to present for the opposite view. This
proposition that ‘pleasure alone is good as an end,’ the fundamental
proposition of Ethical Hedonism, will then appear, in Professor
Sidgwick’s language, as an object of intuition. I shall try to shew you
why my intuition denies it, just as his intuition affirms it. It _may_
always be true notwithstanding; neither intuition can _prove_ whether
it is true or not; I am bound to be satisfied, if I can ‘present
considerations capable of determining the intellect’ to reject it.
Now it may be said that this is a very unsatisfactory state of things.
It is indeed; but it is important to make a distinction between two
different reasons, which may be given for calling it unsatisfactory.
Is it unsatisfactory because our principle cannot be proved? or is
it unsatisfactory merely because we do not agree with one another
about it? I am inclined to think that the latter is the chief reason.
For the mere fact that in certain cases proof is impossible does not
usually give us the least uneasiness. For instance, nobody can prove
that this is a chair beside me; yet I do not suppose that any one is
much dissatisfied for that reason. We all agree that it is a chair,
and that is enough to content us, although it is quite possible we may
be wrong. A madman, of course, might come in and say that it is not a
chair but an elephant. We could not prove that he was wrong, and the
fact that he did not agree with us might then begin to make us uneasy.
Much more, then, shall we be uneasy, if some one, whom we do not think
to be mad, disagrees with us. We shall try to argue with him, and we
shall probably be content if we lead him to agree with us, although we
shall not have proved our point. We can only persuade him by shewing
him that our view is consistent with something else which he holds to
be true, whereas his original view is contradictory to it. But it will
be impossible to prove that that something else, which we both agree
to be true, is really so; we shall be satisfied to have settled the
matter in dispute by means of it, merely because we are agreed on it.
In short, our dissatisfaction in these cases is almost always of the
type felt by the poor lunatic in the story. ‘I said the world was
mad,’ says he, ‘and the world said that I was mad; and, confound it,
they outvoted me.’ It is, I say, almost always such a disagreement, and
not the impossibility of proof, which makes us call the state of things
unsatisfactory. For, indeed, who can prove that proof itself is a
warrant of truth? We are all agreed that the laws of logic are true and
therefore we accept a result which is proved by their means; but such
a proof is satisfactory to us only because we are all so fully agreed
that it is a warrant of truth. And yet we cannot, by the nature of the
case, prove that we are right in being so agreed.
Accordingly, I do not think we need be much distressed by our admission
that we cannot prove whether pleasure alone is good or not. We may be
able to arrive at an agreement notwithstanding; and if so, I think
it will be satisfactory. And yet I am not very sanguine about our
prospects of such satisfaction. Ethics, and philosophy in general,
have always been in a peculiarly unsatisfactory state. There has been
no agreement about them, as there is about the existence of chairs and
lights and benches. I should therefore be a fool if I hoped to settle
one great point of controversy, now and once for all. It is extremely
improbable I shall convince. It would be highly presumptuous even to
hope that in the end, say two or three centuries hence, it will be
agreed that pleasure is not the sole good. Philosophical questions
are so difficult, the problems they raise are so complex, that no one
can fairly expect, now, any more than in the past, to win more than a
very limited assent. And yet I confess that the considerations which
I am about to present appear to me to be absolutely convincing. I do
think that they _ought_ to convince, if only I can put them well.
In any case, I can but try. I _shall_ try now to put an end to that
unsatisfactory state of things, of which I have been speaking. I shall
try to produce an agreement that the fundamental principle of Hedonism
is very like an absurdity, by shewing what it must mean, if it is
clearly thought out, and how that clear meaning is in conflict with
other beliefs, which will, I hope, not be so easily given up.
=46.= Well, then, we now proceed to discuss Intuitionistic Hedonism.
And the beginning of this discussion marks, it is to be observed, a
turning-point in my ethical method. The point I have been labouring
hitherto, the point that ‘good is indefinable,’ and that to deny this
involves a fallacy, is a point capable of strict proof: for to deny it
involves contradictions. But now we are coming to the question, for
the sake of answering which Ethics exists, the question what things or
qualities are good. Of any answer to _this_ question no direct proof
is possible, and that, just because of our former answer, as to the
meaning of good, direct proof _was_ possible. We are now confined to
the hope of what Mill calls ‘indirect proof,’ the hope of determining
one another’s intellect; and we are now so confined, just because, in
the matter of the former question we are not so confined. Here, then,
is an intuition to be submitted to our verdict--the intuition that
‘pleasure alone is good as an end--good in and for itself.’
=47.= Well, in this connection it seems first desirable to touch on
another doctrine of Mill’s--another doctrine which, in the interest
of Hedonism, Professor Sidgwick has done very wisely to reject.
This is the doctrine of ‘difference of quality in pleasures.’ ‘If I
am asked,’ says Mill[17], ‘what I mean by difference of quality in
pleasures, or what makes one pleasure more valuable than another,
merely as a pleasure, except its being greater in amount, there is but
one possible answer. Of two pleasures, if there be one to which all
or almost all who have experience of both give a decided preference,
irrespective of any feeling of moral obligation to prefer it, that is
the more desirable pleasure. If one of the two is, by those who are
competently acquainted with both, placed so far above the other that
they prefer it, even though knowing it to be attended with a greater
amount of discontent, and would not resign it for any quantity of the
other pleasure which their nature is capable of, we are justified in
ascribing to the preferred enjoyment a superiority in quality, so far
outweighing quantity as to render it, in comparison, of small account.’
[17] p. 12.
Now it is well known that Bentham rested his case for Hedonism on
‘quantity of pleasure’ alone. It was his maxim, that ‘quantity
of pleasure being equal, pushpin is as good as poetry.’ And Mill
apparently considers Bentham to have proved that nevertheless poetry
is better than pushpin; that poetry does produce a greater quantity of
pleasure. But yet, says Mill, the Utilitarians ‘might have taken the
other and, as it may be called, higher ground, with entire consistency’
(p. 11). Now we see from this that Mill acknowledges ‘quality of
pleasure’ to be another or different ground for estimating pleasures,
than Bentham’s quantity; and moreover, by that question-begging
‘higher,’ which he afterwards translates into ‘superior,’ he seems to
betray an uncomfortable feeling, that, after all, if you take quantity
of pleasure for your only standard, something may be wrong and you
may deserve to be called a pig. And it may presently appear that you
very likely would deserve that name. But, meanwhile, I only wish to
shew that Mill’s admissions as to quality of pleasure are either
inconsistent with his Hedonism, or else afford no other ground for it
than would be given by mere quantity of pleasure.
It will be seen that Mill’s test for one pleasure’s superiority
in quality over another is the preference of most people who have
experienced both. A pleasure so preferred, he holds, is more desirable.
But then, as we have seen, he holds that ‘to think of an object as
desirable and to think of it as pleasant are one and the same thing’
(p. 58). He holds, therefore, that the preference of experts merely
proves that one pleasure is pleasanter than another. But if that is
so, how can he distinguish this standard from the standard of quantity
of pleasure? Can one pleasure be pleasanter than another, except in
the sense that it gives _more_ pleasure? ‘Pleasant’ must, if words are
to have any meaning at all, denote some one quality common to all the
things that are pleasant; and, if so, then one thing can only be more
pleasant than another, according as it has more or less of this one
quality. But, then, let us try the other alternative, and suppose that
Mill does not seriously mean that this preference of experts merely
proves one pleasure to be pleasanter than another. Well, in this case
what does ‘preferred’ mean? It cannot mean ‘more desired,’ since, as
we know, the degree of desire is always, according to Mill, in exact
proportion to the degree of pleasantness. But, in that case, the basis
of Mill’s Hedonism collapses, for he is admitting that one thing may
be preferred over another, and thus proved more desirable, although
it is not more desired. In this case Mill’s judgment of preference is
just a judgment of that intuitional kind which I have been contending
to be necessary to establish the hedonistic or any other principle. It
is a direct judgment that one thing is more desirable, or better than
another; a judgment utterly independent of all considerations as to
whether one thing is more desired or pleasanter than another. This is
to admit that good is good and indefinable.
=48.= And note another point that is brought out by this discussion.
Mill’s judgment of preference, so far from establishing the principle
that pleasure alone is good, is obviously inconsistent with it. He
admits that experts can judge whether one pleasure is more desirable
than another, because pleasures differ in quality. But what does this
mean? If one pleasure can differ from another in quality, that means,
that _a_ pleasure is something complex, something composed, in fact, of
pleasure _in addition to_ that which produces pleasure. For instance,
Mill speaks of ‘sensual indulgences’ as ‘lower pleasures.’ But what
is a sensual indulgence? It is surely a certain excitement of some
sense _together with_ the pleasure caused by such excitement. Mill,
therefore, in admitting that a sensual indulgence can be directly
judged to be lower than another pleasure, in which the degree of
pleasure involved may be the same, is admitting that other things may
be good, or bad, quite independently of the pleasure which accompanies
them. _A_ pleasure is, in fact, merely a misleading term which
conceals the fact that what we are dealing with is not pleasure but
something else, which may indeed necessarily produce pleasure, but is
nevertheless quite distinct from it.
Mill, therefore, in thinking that to estimate quality of pleasure
is quite consistent with his hedonistic principle that pleasure and
absence of pain alone are desirable as ends, has again committed the
fallacy of confusing ends and means. For take even the most favourable
supposition of his meaning; let us suppose that by a pleasure he does
not mean, as his words imply, that which produces pleasure and the
pleasure produced. Let us suppose him to mean that there are various
kinds of pleasure, in the sense in which there are various kinds of
colour--blue, red, green, etc. Even in this case, if we are to say that
our end is colour alone, then, although it is impossible we should
have colour without having some particular colour, yet the particular
colour we must have, is only a _means_ to our having colour, if colour
is really our end. And if colour is our only possible end, as Mill says
pleasure is, then there can be no possible reason for preferring one
colour to another, red, for instance, to blue, except that the one is
more of a colour than the other. Yet the opposite of this is what Mill
is attempting to hold with regard to pleasures.
Accordingly a consideration of Mill’s view that some pleasures are
superior to others _in quality_ brings out one point which may ‘help
to determine the intellect’ with regard to the intuition ‘Pleasure is
the only good.’ For it brings out the fact that if you say ‘pleasure,’
you must mean ‘pleasure’: you must mean some one thing common to all
different ‘pleasures,’ some one thing, which may exist in different
degrees, but which cannot differ in _kind_. I have pointed out that,
if you say, as Mill does, that quality of pleasure is to be taken
into account, then you are no longer holding that pleasure _alone_ is
good as an end, since you imply that something else, something which
is _not_ present in all pleasures, is _also_ good as an end. The
illustration I have given from colour expresses this point in its most
acute form. It is plain that if you say ‘Colour alone is good as an
end,’ then you can give no possible reason for preferring one colour
to another. Your only standard of good and bad will then be ‘colour’;
and since red and blue both conform equally to this, the only standard,
you can have no other whereby to judge whether red is better than blue.
It is true that you cannot have colour unless you also have one or
all of the particular colours: they, therefore, if colour is the end,
will all be good as means, but none of them can be better than another
even as a means, far less can any one of them be regarded as an end in
itself. Just so with pleasure: If we do really mean ‘Pleasure alone
is good as an end,’ then we must agree with Bentham that ‘Quantity
of pleasure being equal, pushpin is as good as poetry.’ To have thus
dismissed Mill’s reference to quality of pleasure, is therefore to have
made one step in the desired direction. The reader will now no longer
be prevented from agreeing with me, by any idea that the hedonistic
principle ‘Pleasure alone is good as an end’ is consistent with the
view that one pleasure may be of a better quality than another. These
two views, we have seen, are contradictory to one another. We must
choose between them: and if we choose the latter, then we must give up
the principle of Hedonism.
=49.= But, as I said, Professor Sidgwick has seen that they are
inconsistent. He has seen that he must choose between them. He has
chosen. He has rejected the test by quality of pleasure, and has
accepted the hedonistic principle. He still maintains that ‘Pleasure
alone is good as an end.’ I propose therefore to discuss the
considerations which he has offered in order to convince us. I shall
hope by that discussion to remove some more of such prejudices and
misunderstandings as might prevent agreement with me. If I can shew
that some of the considerations which Professor Sidgwick urges are such
as we need by no means agree with, and that others are actually rather
in my favour than in his, we may have again advanced a few steps nearer
to the unanimity which we desire.
=50.= The passages in the _Methods of Ethics_ to which I shall now
invite attention are to be found in I. IX. 4 and in III. XIV. 4-5.
The first of these two passages runs as follows:
“I think that if we consider carefully such permanent results as are
commonly judged to be good, other than qualities of human beings, we
can find nothing that, on reflection, appears to possess this quality
of goodness out of relation to human existence, or at least to some
consciousness or feeling.
“For example, we commonly judge some inanimate objects, scenes, etc. to
be good as possessing beauty, and others bad from ugliness: still no
one would consider it rational to aim at the production of beauty in
external nature, apart from any possible contemplation of it by human
beings. In fact when beauty is maintained to be objective, it is not
commonly meant that it exists as beauty out of relation to any mind
whatsoever: but only that there is some standard of beauty valid for
all minds.
“It may, however, be said that beauty and other results commonly judged
to be good, though we do not conceive them to exist out of relation to
human beings (or at least minds of some kind), are yet so far separable
as ends from the human beings on whom their existence depends, that
their realization may conceivably come into competition with the
perfection or happiness of these beings. Thus, though beautiful
things cannot be thought worth producing except as possible objects
of contemplation, still a man may devote himself to their production
without any consideration of the persons who are to contemplate them.
Similarly knowledge is a good which cannot exist except in minds; and
yet one may be more interested in the development of knowledge than in
its possession by any particular minds; and may take the former as an
ultimate end without regarding the latter.
“Still, as soon as the alternatives are clearly apprehended, it will, I
think, be generally held that beauty, knowledge, and other ideal goods,
as well as all external material things, are only reasonably to be
sought by men in so far as they conduce (1) to Happiness or (2) to the
Perfection or Excellence of human existence. I say ‘human,’ for though
most utilitarians consider the pleasure (and freedom from pain) of the
inferior animals to be included in the Happiness which they take as the
right and proper end of conduct, no one seems to contend that we ought
to aim at perfecting brutes except as a means to our ends, or at least
as objects of scientific or æsthetic contemplation for us. Nor, again,
can we include, as a practical end, the existence of beings above the
human. We certainly apply the idea of Good to the Divine Existence,
just as we do to His work, and indeed in a preeminent manner: and
when it is said that, ‘we should do all things to the glory of God,’
it may seem to be implied that the existence of God is made better by
our glorifying Him. Still this inference when explicitly drawn appears
somewhat impious; and theologians generally recoil from it, and
refrain from using the notion of a possible addition to the Goodness of
the Divine Existence as a ground of human duty. Nor can the influence
of our actions on other extra-human intelligences besides the Divine be
at present made matter of scientific discussion.
“I shall therefore confidently lay down, that if there be any Good
other than Happiness to be sought by man, as an ultimate practical
end, it can only be the Goodness, Perfection, or Excellence of Human
Existence. How far this notion includes more than Virtue, what its
precise relation to Pleasure is, and to what method we shall be
logically led if we accept it as fundamental, are questions which we
shall more conveniently discuss after the detailed examination of these
two other notions, Pleasure and Virtue, in which we shall be engaged in
the two following Books.”
It will be observed that in this passage Prof. Sidgwick tries to limit
the range of objects among which the ultimate end may be found. He does
not yet say what that end is, but he does exclude from it everything
but certain characters of Human Existence. And the possible ends, which
he thus excludes, do not again come up for consideration. They are put
out of court once for all by this passage and by this passage only. Now
is this exclusion justified?
I cannot think it is. ‘No one,’ says Prof. Sidgwick, ‘would consider
it rational to aim at the production of beauty in external nature,
apart from any possible contemplation of it by human beings.’ Well, I
may say at once, that I, for one, do consider this rational; and let
us see if I cannot get any one to agree with me. Consider what this
admission really means. It entitles us to put the following case. Let
us imagine one world exceedingly beautiful. Imagine it as beautiful as
you can; put into it whatever on this earth you most admire--mountains,
rivers, the sea; trees, and sunsets, stars and moon. Imagine these all
combined in the most exquisite proportions, so that no one thing jars
against another, but each contributes to increase the beauty of the
whole. And then imagine the ugliest world you can possibly conceive.
Imagine it simply one heap of filth, containing everything that is
most disgusting to us, for whatever reason, and the whole, as far
as may be, without one redeeming feature. Such a pair of worlds we
are entitled to compare: they fall within Prof. Sidgwick’s meaning,
and the comparison is highly relevant to it. The only thing we are
not entitled to imagine is that any human being ever has or ever, by
any possibility, _can_, live in either, can ever see and enjoy the
beauty of the one or hate the foulness of the other. Well, even so,
supposing them quite apart from any possible contemplation by human
beings; still, is it irrational to hold that it is better that the
beautiful world should exist, than the one which is ugly? Would it not
be well, in any case, to do what we could to produce it rather than
the other? Certainly I cannot help thinking that it would; and I hope
that some may agree with me in this extreme instance. The instance is
extreme. It is highly improbable, not to say, impossible, we should
ever have such a choice before us. In any actual choice we should have
to consider the possible effects of our action upon conscious beings,
and among these possible effects there are always some, I think, which
ought to be preferred to the existence of mere beauty. But this only
means that in our present state, in which but a very small portion of
the good is attainable, the pursuit of beauty for its own sake must
always be postponed to the pursuit of some greater good, which is
equally attainable. But it is enough for my purpose, if it be admitted
that, _supposing_ no greater good were at all attainable, then beauty
must in itself be regarded as a greater good than ugliness; if it be
admitted that, in that case, we should not be left without any reason
for preferring one course of action to another, we should not be left
without any duty whatever, but that it would then be our positive duty
to make the world more beautiful, so far as we were able, since nothing
better than beauty could then result from our efforts. If this be once
admitted, if in any imaginable case you do admit that the existence
of a more beautiful thing is better in itself than that of one more
ugly, quite apart from its effects on any human feeling, then Prof.
Sidgwick’s principle has broken down. Then we shall have to include
in our ultimate end something beyond the limits of human existence. I
admit, of course, that our beautiful world would be better still, if
there were human beings in it to contemplate and enjoy its beauty. But
that admission makes nothing against my point. If it be once admitted
that the beautiful world _in itself_ is better than the ugly, then it
follows, that however many beings may enjoy it, and however much better
their enjoyment may be than it is itself, yet its mere existence adds
_something_ to the goodness of the whole: it is not only a means to our
end, but also itself a part thereof.
=51.= In the second passage to which I referred above, Prof. Sidgwick
returns from the discussion of Virtue and Pleasure, with which he has
meanwhile been engaged, to consider what among the parts of Human
Existence to which, as we saw, he has limited the ultimate end, can
really be considered as such end. What I have just said, of course,
appears to me to destroy the force of this part of his argument too.
If, as I think, other things than any part of Human Existence can be
ends-in-themselves, then Prof. Sidgwick cannot claim to have discovered
the Summum Bonum, when he has merely determined what parts of Human
Existence are in themselves desirable. But this error may be admitted
to be utterly insignificant in comparison with that which we are now
about to discuss.
“It may be said,” says Prof. Sidgwick (III. XIV. §§ 4-5), “that we
may ... regard cognition of Truth, contemplation of Beauty, Free or
Virtuous action, as in some measure preferable alternatives to Pleasure
or Happiness--even though we admit that Happiness must be included as
a part of Ultimate Good.... I think, however, that this view ought not
to commend itself to the sober judgment of reflective persons. In order
to shew this, I must ask the reader to use the same twofold procedure
that I before requested him to employ in considering the absolute and
independent validity of common moral precepts. I appeal firstly to
his intuitive judgment after due consideration of the question when
fairly placed before it: and secondly to a comprehensive comparison
of the ordinary judgments of mankind. As regards the first argument,
to me at least it seems clear after reflection that these objective
relations of the conscious subject, when distinguished from the
consciousness accompanying and resulting from them, are not ultimately
and intrinsically desirable; any more than material or other objects
are, when considered apart from any relation to conscious existence.
Admitting that we have actual experience of such preferences as have
just been described, of which the ultimate object is something that
is not merely consciousness: it still seems to me that when (to use
Butler’s phrase) we ‘sit down in a cool hour,’ we can only justify to
ourselves the importance that we attach to any of these objects by
considering its conduciveness, in one way or another, to the happiness
of sentient beings.
“The second argument, that refers to the common sense of mankind,
obviously cannot be made completely cogent; since, as above stated,
several cultivated persons do habitually judge that knowledge, art,
etc.,--not to speak of Virtue--are ends independently of the pleasure
derived from them. But we may urge not only that all these elements
of ‘ideal good’ are productive of pleasure in various ways; but also
that they seem to obtain the commendation of Common Sense, roughly
speaking, in proportion to the degree of this productiveness. This
seems obviously true of Beauty; and will hardly be denied in respect
of any kind of social ideal: it is paradoxical to maintain that any
degree of Freedom, or any form of social order, would still be commonly
regarded as desirable even if we were certain that it had no tendency
to promote the general happiness. The case of Knowledge is rather more
complex; but certainly Common Sense is most impressed with the value
of knowledge, when its ‘fruitfulness’ has been demonstrated. It is,
however, aware that experience has frequently shewn how knowledge, long
fruitless, may become unexpectedly fruitful, and how light may be shed
on one part of the field of knowledge from another apparently remote:
and even if any particular branch of scientific pursuit could be shewn
to be devoid of even this indirect utility, it would still deserve some
respect on utilitarian grounds; both as furnishing to the inquirer
the refined and innocent pleasures of curiosity, and because the
intellectual disposition which it exhibits and sustains is likely on
the whole to produce fruitful knowledge. Still in cases approximating
to this last, Common Sense is somewhat disposed to complain of the
mis-direction of valuable effort; so that the meed of honour commonly
paid to Science seems to be graduated, though perhaps unconsciously,
by a tolerably exact utilitarian scale. Certainly the moment the
legitimacy of any branch of scientific inquiry is seriously disputed,
as in the recent case of vivisection, the controversy on both sides is
generally conducted on an avowedly utilitarian basis.
“The case of Virtue requires special consideration: since the
encouragement in each other of virtuous impulses and dispositions is a
main aim of men’s ordinary moral discourse; so that even to raise the
question whether this encouragement can go too far has a paradoxical
air. Still, our experience includes rare and exceptional cases in which
the concentration of effort on the cultivation of virtue has seemed to
have effects adverse to general happiness, through being intensified
to the point of moral fanaticism, and so involving a neglect of other
conditions of happiness. If, then, we admit as actual or possible
such ‘infelicific’ effects of the cultivation of Virtue, I think we
shall also generally admit that, in the case supposed, conduciveness
to general happiness should be the criterion for deciding how far the
cultivation of Virtue should be carried.”
There we have Prof. Sidgwick’s argument completed. We ought not, he
thinks, to aim at knowing the Truth, or at contemplating Beauty,
except in so far as such knowledge or such contemplation contributes
to increase the pleasure or to diminish the pain of sentient beings.
Pleasure alone is good for its own sake: knowledge of the Truth is good
only as a means to pleasure.
=52.= Let us consider what this means. What is pleasure? It is
certainly something of which we may be conscious, and which, therefore,
may be distinguished from our consciousness of it. What I wish first to
ask is this: Can it really be said that we value pleasure, except in
so far as we are conscious of it? Should we think that the attainment
of pleasure, of which we never were and never could be conscious, was
something to be aimed at for its own sake? It may be impossible that
such pleasure should ever exist, that it should ever be thus divorced
from consciousness; although there is certainly much reason to believe
that it is not only possible but very common. But, even supposing
that it were impossible, that is quite irrelevant. Our question is:
Is it the pleasure, as distinct from the consciousness of it, that we
set value on? Do we think the pleasure valuable in itself, or must
we insist that, if we are to think the pleasure good, we must have
consciousness of it too?
This consideration is very well put by Socrates in Plato’s dialogue
_Philebus_ (21 A).
‘Would _you_ accept, Protarchus,’ says Socrates, ‘to live your whole
life in the enjoyment of the greatest pleasures?’ ‘Of course I would,’
says Protarchus.
_Socrates._ Then would you think you needed anything else besides, if
you possessed this one blessing in completeness?
_Protarchus._ Certainly not.
_Socrates._ Consider what you are saying. You would not need to be wise
and intelligent and reasonable, nor anything like this? Would you not
even care to keep your sight?
_Protarchus._ Why should I? I suppose I should have all I want, if I
was pleased.
_Socrates._ Well, then, supposing you lived so, you would enjoy always
throughout your life the greatest pleasure?
_Protarchus._ Of course.
_Socrates._ But, on the other hand, inasmuch as you would _not_ possess
intelligence and memory and knowledge and true opinion, you would, in
the first place, necessarily be without the knowledge whether you were
pleased or not. For you would be devoid of any kind of wisdom. You
admit this?
_Protarchus._ I do. The consequence is absolutely necessary.
_Socrates._ Well, then, besides this, not having memory, you must
also be unable to remember even that you ever were pleased; of the
pleasure which falls upon you at the moment not the least vestige must
afterwards remain. And again, not having true opinion, you cannot think
that you are pleased when you are; and, being bereft of your reasoning
faculties, you cannot even have the power to reckon that you will be
pleased in future. You must live the life of an oyster, or of some
other of those living creatures, whose home is the seas and whose
souls are concealed in shelly bodies. Is all this so, or can we think
otherwise than this?
_Protarchus._ How can we?
_Socrates._ Well, then, can we think such a life desirable?
_Protarchus._ Socrates, your reasoning has left me utterly dumb.’
Socrates, we see, persuades Protarchus that Hedonism is absurd. If
we are really going to maintain that pleasure alone is good as an
end, we must maintain that it is good, whether we are conscious of
it or not. We must declare it reasonable to take as our ideal (an
unattainable ideal it may be) that we should be as happy as possible,
even on condition that we never know and never can know that we are
happy. We must be willing to sell in exchange for the mere happiness
every vestige of knowledge, both in ourselves and in others, both
of happiness itself and of every other thing. Can we really still
disagree? Can any one still declare it obvious that this is reasonable?
That pleasure alone is good as an end?
The case, it is plain, is just like that of the colours[18], only,
as yet, not nearly so strong. It is far more possible that we should
some day be able to produce the intensest pleasure, without any
consciousness that it is there, than that we should be able to produce
mere colour, without its being any particular colour. Pleasure and
consciousness can be far more easily distinguished from one another,
than colour from the particular colours. And yet even if this were
not so, we should be bound to distinguish them if we really wished to
declare pleasure alone to be our ultimate end. Even if consciousness
were an inseparable accompaniment of pleasure, a _sine quâ non_ of
its existence, yet, if pleasure is the only end, we are bound to call
consciousness a mere _means_ to it, in any intelligible sense that can
be given to the word _means_. And if, on the other hand, as I hope is
now plain, the pleasure would be comparatively valueless without the
consciousness, then we are bound to say that pleasure is _not_ the only
end, that some consciousness at least must be included with it as a
veritable part of the end.
[18] § 48 _sup._
For our question now is solely what the end is: it is quite another
question how far that end may be attainable _by itself_, or must
involve the simultaneous attainment of other things. It may well be
that the _practical_ conclusions at which Utilitarians do arrive,
and even those at which they ought logically to arrive, are not far
from the truth. But in so far as their _reason_ for holding these
conclusions to be true is that ‘Pleasure alone is good as an end,’ they
are _absolutely_ wrong: and it is with _reasons_ that we are chiefly
concerned in any scientific Ethics.
=53.= It seems, then, clear that Hedonism is in error, so far as it
maintains that pleasure alone, and not the consciousness of pleasure,
is the sole good. And this error seems largely due to the fallacy which
I pointed out above in Mill--the fallacy of confusing means and end.
It is falsely supposed that, since pleasure must always be accompanied
by consciousness (which is, itself, extremely doubtful), therefore
it is indifferent whether we say that pleasure or the consciousness
of pleasure is the sole good. _Practically_, of course, it would be
indifferent at which we aimed, if it were certain that we could not
get the one without the other; but where the question is of what is
good in itself--where we ask: For the sake of what is it desirable to
get that which we aim at?--the distinction is by no means unimportant.
Here we are placed before an exclusive alternative. _Either_ pleasure
by itself (even though we can’t get it) would be all that is desirable,
_or_ a consciousness of it would be more desirable still. Both these
propositions cannot be true; and I think it is plain that the latter is
true; whence it follows that pleasure is _not_ the sole good.
Still it may be said that, even if consciousness of pleasure, and
not pleasure alone, is the sole good, this conclusion is not very
damaging to Hedonism. It may be said that Hedonists have always meant
by pleasure the consciousness of pleasure, though they have not been at
pains to say so; and this, I think is, in the main, true. To correct
their formula in this respect could, therefore, only be a matter of
practical importance, if it is possible to produce pleasure without
producing consciousness of it. But even this importance, which I think
our conclusion so far really has, is, I admit, comparatively slight.
What I wish to maintain is that even consciousness of pleasure is
not the sole good: that, indeed, it is absurd so to regard it. And
the chief importance of what has been said so far lies in the fact
that the same method, which shews that consciousness of pleasure is
more valuable than pleasure, seems also to shew that consciousness of
pleasure is itself far less valuable than other things. The supposition
that consciousness of pleasure is the sole good is due to a neglect of
the same distinctions which have encouraged the careless assertion that
pleasure is the sole good.
The method which I employed in order to shew that pleasure itself
was not the sole good, was that of considering what value we should
attach to it, if it existed in absolute isolation, stripped of all its
usual accompaniments. And this is, in fact, the only method that can
be safely used, when we wish to discover what degree of value a thing
has in itself. The necessity of employing this method will be best
exhibited by a discussion of the arguments used by Prof. Sidgwick in
the passage last quoted, and by an exposure of the manner in which they
are calculated to mislead.
=54.= With regard to the second of them, it only maintains that other
things, which might be supposed to share with pleasure the attribute
of goodness, ‘seem to obtain the commendation of Common Sense, roughly
speaking, in proportion to the degree’ of their productiveness of
pleasure. Whether even this rough proportion holds between the
commendation of Common Sense and the felicific effects of that which it
commends is a question extremely difficult to determine; and we need
not enter into it here. For, even assuming it to be true, and assuming
the judgments of Common Sense to be on the whole correct, what would it
shew? It would shew, certainly, that pleasure was a good _criterion_
of right action--that the same conduct which produced most pleasure
would also produce most good on the whole. But this would by no means
entitle us to the conclusion that the greatest pleasure _constituted_
what was best on the whole: it would still leave open the alternative
that the greatest quantity of pleasure was as a matter of fact, _under
actual conditions_, generally accompanied by the greatest quantity
of _other goods_, and that it therefore was _not_ the sole good. It
might indeed seem to be a strange coincidence that these two things
should always, even in this world, be in proportion to one another.
But the strangeness of this coincidence will certainly not entitle us
to argue directly that it does not exist--that it is an illusion, due
to the fact that pleasure is really the sole good. The coincidence may
be susceptible of other explanations; and it would even be our duty
to accept it unexplained, if direct intuition seemed to declare that
pleasure was not the sole good. Moreover it must be remembered that
the need for assuming such a coincidence rests in any case upon the
extremely doubtful proposition that felicific effects _are_ roughly in
proportion to the approval of Common Sense. And it should be observed
that, though Prof. Sidgwick maintains this to be the case, his detailed
illustrations only tend to shew the very different proposition that a
thing is not held to be good, unless it gives a balance of pleasure;
not that the degree of commendation is in proportion to the quantity of
pleasure.
=55.= The decision, then, must rest upon Prof. Sidgwick’s first
argument--‘the appeal’ to our ‘intuitive judgment after due
consideration of the question when fairly placed before it.’ And here
it seems to me plain that Prof. Sidgwick has failed, in two essential
respects, to place the question fairly before either himself or his
reader.
(1) What he has to shew is, as he says himself, not merely that
‘Happiness must be included as a part of Ultimate Good.’ This view,
he says, ‘ought not to commend itself to the sober judgment of
reflective persons.’ And why? Because ‘these objective relations,
when distinguished from the consciousness accompanying and resulting
from them, are not ultimately and intrinsically desirable.’ Now, this
reason, which is offered as shewing that to consider Happiness as
a mere part of Ultimate Good does not meet the facts of intuition,
is, on the contrary, only sufficient to shew that it _is_ a part of
Ultimate Good. For from the fact that no value resides in one part
of a whole, considered by itself, we cannot infer that all the value
belonging to the whole does reside in the other part, considered by
itself. Even if we admit that there is much value in the enjoyment of
Beauty, and none in the mere contemplation of it, which is one of the
constituents of that complex fact, it does not follow that all the
value belongs to the other constituent, namely, the pleasure which we
take in contemplating it. It is quite possible that this constituent
also has no value in itself; that the value belongs to the whole state,
and to that only: so that _both_ the pleasure _and_ the contemplation
are mere parts of the good, and both of them equally necessary parts.
In short, Prof. Sidgwick’s argument here depends upon the neglect of
that principle, which I tried to explain in my first chapter and which
I said I should call the principle of ‘organic relations[19].’ The
argument is calculated to mislead, because it supposes that, if we see
a whole state to be valuable, and also see that one element of that
state has no value _by itself_, then the other element, _by itself_,
must have all the value which belongs to the whole state. The fact
is, on the contrary, that, since the whole may be organic, the other
element need have no value whatever, and that even if it have some, the
value of the whole may be very much greater. For this reason, as well
as to avoid confusion between means and end, it is absolutely essential
to consider each distinguishable quality, _in isolation_, in order to
decide what value it possesses. Prof. Sidgwick, on the other hand,
applies this method of isolation only to _one_ element in the wholes
he is considering. He does not ask the question: If consciousness
of pleasure existed absolutely by itself, would a sober judgment be
able to attribute much value to it? It is, in fact, always misleading
to take a whole, that is valuable (or the reverse), and then to ask
simply: To which of its constituents does this whole owe its value or
its vileness? It may well be that it owes it to _none_; and, if one of
them does appear to have some value in itself, we shall be led into the
grave error of supposing that all the value of the whole belongs to it
alone. It seems to me that this error has commonly been committed with
regard to pleasure. Pleasure does seem to be a necessary constituent
of most valuable wholes; and, since the other constituents, into which
we may analyse them, may easily seem not to have any value, it is
natural to suppose that all the value belongs to pleasure. That this
natural supposition does not follow from the premises is certain; and
that it is, on the contrary, ridiculously far from the truth appears
evident to my ‘reflective judgment.’ If we apply either to pleasure or
to consciousness of pleasure the only safe method, that of isolation,
and ask ourselves: Could we accept, as a very good thing, that mere
consciousness of pleasure, and absolutely nothing else, should exist,
even in the greatest quantities? I think we can have no doubt about
answering: No. Far less can we accept this as the _sole_ good. Even
if we accept Prof. Sidgwick’s implication (which yet appears to me
extremely doubtful) that consciousness of pleasure has a greater
value by itself than Contemplation of Beauty, it seems to me that a
pleasurable Contemplation of Beauty has certainly an immeasurably
greater value than mere Consciousness of Pleasure. In favour of this
conclusion I can appeal with confidence to the ‘sober judgment of
reflective persons.’
[19] pp. 27-30, 36.